"Overall, I was more impressed with the antispyware program's protective measures and simple interface than with its ability to cleanse existing infections. Still, Microsoft seems to be on the right path to fixing the mess caused by the careless users, malicious programmers, unethical companies and vulnerable software."
This is by no means a positive review, however it is a far cry from the one word characterization "ineffective" used in the teaser for this "story".
Are we really that afraid of them that we need to hyperbolize this way?
The military is not here to protect the people, it is here to protect the country. The police are not here to protect you, they are here to respond to crime. Crime prevention is a misnomer of the modern age, not a reality at all. If you are not defending yourself, you need to do it yourself or, as most (very hypocritical, I'll note, in so doing) celebrities do, contract for personal protection.
Well, thank you so much for cementing my argument against your point about an armed populus protecting the country from insurgeny, both domestic and foreign. I agree that the military protects our country. Doesn't that, by definition, protect the people? Aren't you just arguing semantics here? I never brought up the police.
Now, to the negligent ownership of guns that occasionally does injure or even kill people, and even children. You have not addressed the drownings in buckets. Would you ban buckets of water? How about windows higher than a foot above ground level? Bathtubs? Cars are more common killers than all of these combined, of course, but you would not argue for a total ban on personal ownership of motor vehicles. You ignore this altogether and claim that, if "it saved even 1 four year old or 1 convenience store clerk," you are against any private ownership of guns whatsoever, even in the face of legitimate social purposes. No element of this argument cannot be more strongly made against cars or bathtubs.
This was answered in the last paragraph of my post previous. Re-read it and I still stand by it.
Now, to the real important bit - you argue all along that there is no truly legitimate purpose for me to own a gun. Let us presume, quite falsely, that you are correct. Now, tell me why I should not be allowed to own a gun? There is no social purpose to a gay couple engaging in sexual activities, to you having a pet dog or cat in your home, or to allowing people to cook on a gas range, but we do not ban these activities outright, because of our respect for personal liberty. Just because you can't see a reason why I should own a gun does not mean that I must be prevented from doing so.
Well, I guess the last paragraph from my previous message was a tough one to find. Society must weigh the value of the item and determine if its value outweighs its inherent risks. If value outweighs risk, society keeps it and moves on. If risk outweighs value, it must be removed from society. Simple. I feel guns have no value to a civilian population apart from sport/recreation and since it is, obviously, impossible to simply limit them to that particular situation, I say ban them for civilians.
As much as I enjoy a debate, I think I now understand your position but you have not swayed me. The gay marriage point was very illuminating for me to help understand the person to whom I am speaking. No, I'm not gay nor wishing to be wed in a gay wedding nor do I have friends or family who are gay and wishing to marry. You, of course, may rebutt but I will not enter (yet another) protracted gun control debate. It is a situation that, like abortion, is too incendiary to ever be settled without one side or the other feeling like they got shafted. I thank you for your input and wish you a good day. I also sincerely hope that you do not find yourself in a situation where you need to defend yourself or your family with the lethal force you champion.
First off, thank you for taking the time to lay that out. It is obvious you have spent a lot of time and thought on this topic. Certainly far more than I.
The second amendment is about "the security of a free state," from enemies both foreign and domestic. If Germans, Japanese, Russians, or even terrorists came and attacked me, I would be able to shoot back. That's why none of those groups ever invaded the United States by land.
See, this is the crux of my point. I don't accept this as fact. If this were a debate about the mighty American military, any excuse for a safe domestic situation other than a mighty army would be laughed off. However, 200+ years ago, an armed civil population was a requirement to help fend off attack. I do not accept that, in 2005, a well armed civil poulation is a deterent to any (are there any left) well organized and funded armies. There are 2 reasons the US has not been attacked by enemy forces:
1. The mightiest armed forces on the planet.
2. Surrounded on 4 sides by a combination of 2 oceans, Mexico and Canada (listed in order of threat, worst to most-kittenish).
And on that note, how do countries with notoriously low gun percapita's manage to stave of foreign insurgency without M-16's?
I suggest that the specific nature of the 2nd Amendment makes it dated in our times. I feel that if the free ownership of weapons would be served by any argument, the fact that an armed populus prevents attack is not the one to choose. It is the exact type of argument that is dated. A 40 year old weekend warrior who needs a converted AK does not make me feel safe from Iraqi attack. The fact the country is protected by a kickass army makes me feel pretty good though.
I respect your point of view and opinion, I just don't share it. You say they are required in civilian life, I say they are a recreational pasttime (no less important than mine but not required). I am not as specific in my beliefs as you laid out. I simply think that if every gun was taken out of the picture (an impossibility, I understand, hence the never-ending nature of this debate) and it saved even 1 four year old or 1 convenience store clerk, then sorry, the deer hunting has got to go.
I can already hear you saying "Ah, ah, ah, the convenience store clerk can still get killed. If the guy doesn't have a gun, he'll have a knife". Granted, but society has to weigh each situation individually. Does the knife serve humanity as a tool enough to offset the danger? Perhaps. Perhaps not. How about guns? Maybe, maybe not.
At some point, don't we get to question the validity of the tenets of our forefathers? I mean, it wasn't that long ago that Ronald Reagan was telling us how smooth his brand of smokes were. It wasn't that long ago that buying black people was an ok thing to do.
Just because it was a good idea 200+ years ago doesn't necessarily make it an idea that ages well.
Is there no room for critical re-examination of these cornerstones to see if we, as a people, have evolved past them? I have a hard time believing the founding fathers thought they would be interpreted so literally hundreds of years later.
Also, I am not the AC upthread. You sound like someone who is very dyed in the wool in your position and I want to understand.
Had both eyes done at once (Lasik) and mine were bad but with minor astigmatism. I thik they were like 20/200+ each before.
After a VERY simple procedure (apart from the razor cutting a flap in your cornea), the recovery process was about 2 days long and now, after 1 year, I have absolutely no ill effects (apart from temp night halos for a bit but they went away after about 6 months).
"It's a fair cop" is quite common British slang for getting busted by the cops. I have read in numerous places as well as a published script for the movie and the line is indeed "It's a fair cop".
Wow, if I had mod points, I would lash one to you right now for reminding me of this item. I checked the page and lo and behold, my name was just dragged through the interplanetary mud, so to speak.
Would you mind detailing exactly which of these he had authorization to do?
1. Use gate program to create an opening in the corporate firewall against (twice expressed) wishes of employer.
2. Download the password file from a department he was no longer working in (or authorized to be working in) and run a password cracking program on it.
3. Extract and store, offsite, over 35 compromised passwords from same file.
So, since these seem to be the basic facts of the story, as I read it, perhaps shedding some light on which of these he had permission to do would help your story. In fact, the information I read shows exactly the opposite of what you are saying.
I have not seen the details of the jump but he will likely be using a drogue chute as did Joe Kittinger in the 50's.
A drogue chute is a small parachute that is deployed to slow the terminal velocity of a skydiver to a manageable level. If you have ever watched a tandem jump (skydiving instructor attached directly to the student at the shoulders and hips from the rear) you have seen a drogue chute. They are used because tandems present equal surface area but roughy double the mass (sometimes more) of a normail, sungle skydiver and tend to accelerate to un-manageable speeds. (The faster you travel, the more violent and "touchy" the body movements become having greater and greater effect on relative position in the air.)
In the case of Kittinger's space jump, his drogue was substantially larger than the main parachutes we use today but the density of the air is so thin that it needs to be very large to have any effect.
Actually, I believe the character is modelled after the 80's New Wave band of the same name.
That redhead was wicked hot.
I think it would depend on the circumstances
on
Rebooting The World?
·
· Score: 1
I think the direct cause of the loss of the technology (as well as the time spent in luddite-ville) would have a definite effect on the speed and method of re-development.
If it was a "instant" catastrophe that caused the loss, I would like to think that the people in the world best suited to redesign and rebuild the technlogy base would commit themselves to the critical systems first. Health care, transport, communications, certain infrastructure.
The big problem I see is with the vast majority of the population ignorant of anything beyond how to shut down before turning off their machine. After critical systems have been restored, the work on revenue generating tech can begin. I have a hard time believeing that the industry giants will tolerate anything but the minimum amount of time required to become re-operational (This will be further exascerbated by the now-evident feeling of "being the first x-business back in operation".)
In short, if that is possible, I feel our rush to re-tech the world will overshadow our desire to redesign it past our old limitations. Certainly some innovations will become evident but they will primarily focus on tech that is purpose built to quickly re-equip (tech wise) the world.
An interesting thought. Would Microsoft be able to re-establish their dominance? I have often thought that their market share is due to an exisiting install base.
Battlestar Galactica was an ok show but the only thing that held any interest for me as a child was the Vipers. Those were the coolset space fighters around. I used to draw them all the time in school...
But..., that piece of crap pales in comparison to the majesty that was Space 1999. I wish they would remake THAT show. I had nightmares for months about the episode where they came across a spaceship graveyard which had a tentacle monster that would pull you undernetath itself and then slide out a smoking, charred corpse. By your command indeed.
I know it's off topic. Mod me down, I don't care but someone please remake Space 1999!
I feel I am in a position to pretend my opinion on this matter is important and espouse it thus:
I worked with co-op students from, primarily, the high school level. One noticeable way to classify them:
Student 1> "I was watching that guy over there and it looks like he is working on something I would be interested in. I was hoping it would be ok to look over his shoulder and maybe ask a question or two." Student2 (to his/her friends after work)> " I went to my job co-op today and had to stand around until someone gave me a bunch of boxes to stuff. That place sucks."
You can guess which one is more memorable when it comes time to hiring later in life.
The test I use is the removal test. Who would be most hurt if the co-op program was removed. Industry would survive without the cheap labor as it must. Education would also survive but I can't help but think that it would be less an experience without the opportunity to spend time in the real element. The loss to education is greater than that to industry. Although you feel that it is industry that is somehow benefitting from this exploitation of cheap labor, please remember where you are standing in the first place. Those who take hold and squeeze will get the most from the experience. Those who expect a scripted, curricular experience are missing the boat and will, ultimately, feel the way you do.
In my view, the largest corruption problem is the fact that we are, in effect, self-policing. As Boolean as our world is, there is still a great deal of subjective comparison that is made.
Look at Slashdot, anyone who is a regular reader here is aware of the amazing amount of divergent opinions present on any number of topics by our community.
How many times have you been in, or overheard, a conversation with contemporaries and heard things like "That guy didn't know what the hell he was doing..." or "I guess that is how Company XYZ does it but we do it right etc...". I am sure I will be taken to task for the generalization but we are a very cannabalistic bunch and we all have a very distinct idea of what is good Kung-Fu and what is paper MCSE stuff. We also don't mind sharing our opinions. This story is a good example. I don't know the details of the situation but who am I to judge that the submitter isn't the real idiot who wouldn't know a good plan if it bit him. No offense, I am sure that isn't the case but I am sure not going to take him at face value. People who don't know jack about computers (read most of the population) will certainly listen to him though, right or wrong.
Anyone who has been in a computer store and listened to a salesman talk about another computer store's products or staff knows exactly what I mean. It's no wonder people don't trust us. We all tell them not to trust the next guy. Unfortunately, he is sayng the same thing and he sounds just as smart and knowledable as you.
Slashdot Mirror
the line International Federation of Phonographic Industries
and thought they saw pornographic industry intead of phongraphic.
Of course, I didn't, but I thought some other sick bastards might have that problem.
"Overall, I was more impressed with the antispyware program's protective measures and simple interface than with its ability to cleanse existing infections. Still, Microsoft seems to be on the right path to fixing the mess caused by the careless users, malicious programmers, unethical companies and vulnerable software."
This is by no means a positive review, however it is a far cry from the one word characterization "ineffective" used in the teaser for this "story".
Are we really that afraid of them that we need to hyperbolize this way?
The military is not here to protect the people, it is here to protect the country. The police are not here to protect you, they are here to respond to crime. Crime prevention is a misnomer of the modern age, not a reality at all. If you are not defending yourself, you need to do it yourself or, as most (very hypocritical, I'll note, in so doing) celebrities do, contract for personal protection.
Well, thank you so much for cementing my argument against your point about an armed populus protecting the country from insurgeny, both domestic and foreign. I agree that the military protects our country. Doesn't that, by definition, protect the people? Aren't you just arguing semantics here? I never brought up the police.
Now, to the negligent ownership of guns that occasionally does injure or even kill people, and even children. You have not addressed the drownings in buckets. Would you ban buckets of water? How about windows higher than a foot above ground level? Bathtubs? Cars are more common killers than all of these combined, of course, but you would not argue for a total ban on personal ownership of motor vehicles. You ignore this altogether and claim that, if "it saved even 1 four year old or 1 convenience store clerk," you are against any private ownership of guns whatsoever, even in the face of legitimate social purposes. No element of this argument cannot be more strongly made against cars or bathtubs.
This was answered in the last paragraph of my post previous. Re-read it and I still stand by it.
Now, to the real important bit - you argue all along that there is no truly legitimate purpose for me to own a gun. Let us presume, quite falsely, that you are correct. Now, tell me why I should not be allowed to own a gun? There is no social purpose to a gay couple engaging in sexual activities, to you having a pet dog or cat in your home, or to allowing people to cook on a gas range, but we do not ban these activities outright, because of our respect for personal liberty. Just because you can't see a reason why I should own a gun does not mean that I must be prevented from doing so.
Well, I guess the last paragraph from my previous message was a tough one to find. Society must weigh the value of the item and determine if its value outweighs its inherent risks. If value outweighs risk, society keeps it and moves on. If risk outweighs value, it must be removed from society. Simple. I feel guns have no value to a civilian population apart from sport/recreation and since it is, obviously, impossible to simply limit them to that particular situation, I say ban them for civilians.
As much as I enjoy a debate, I think I now understand your position but you have not swayed me. The gay marriage point was very illuminating for me to help understand the person to whom I am speaking. No, I'm not gay nor wishing to be wed in a gay wedding nor do I have friends or family who are gay and wishing to marry. You, of course, may rebutt but I will not enter (yet another) protracted gun control debate. It is a situation that, like abortion, is too incendiary to ever be settled without one side or the other feeling like they got shafted. I thank you for your input and wish you a good day. I also sincerely hope that you do not find yourself in a situation where you need to defend yourself or your family with the lethal force you champion.
First off, thank you for taking the time to lay that out. It is obvious you have spent a lot of time and thought on this topic. Certainly far more than I.
The second amendment is about "the security of a free state," from enemies both foreign and domestic. If Germans, Japanese, Russians, or even terrorists came and attacked me, I would be able to shoot back. That's why none of those groups ever invaded the United States by land.
See, this is the crux of my point. I don't accept this as fact. If this were a debate about the mighty American military, any excuse for a safe domestic situation other than a mighty army would be laughed off. However, 200+ years ago, an armed civil population was a requirement to help fend off attack. I do not accept that, in 2005, a well armed civil poulation is a deterent to any (are there any left) well organized and funded armies. There are 2 reasons the US has not been attacked by enemy forces:
1. The mightiest armed forces on the planet.
2. Surrounded on 4 sides by a combination of 2 oceans, Mexico and Canada (listed in order of threat, worst to most-kittenish).
And on that note, how do countries with notoriously low gun percapita's manage to stave of foreign insurgency without M-16's?
I suggest that the specific nature of the 2nd Amendment makes it dated in our times. I feel that if the free ownership of weapons would be served by any argument, the fact that an armed populus prevents attack is not the one to choose. It is the exact type of argument that is dated. A 40 year old weekend warrior who needs a converted AK does not make me feel safe from Iraqi attack. The fact the country is protected by a kickass army makes me feel pretty good though.
I respect your point of view and opinion, I just don't share it. You say they are required in civilian life, I say they are a recreational pasttime (no less important than mine but not required). I am not as specific in my beliefs as you laid out. I simply think that if every gun was taken out of the picture (an impossibility, I understand, hence the never-ending nature of this debate) and it saved even 1 four year old or 1 convenience store clerk, then sorry, the deer hunting has got to go.
I can already hear you saying "Ah, ah, ah, the convenience store clerk can still get killed. If the guy doesn't have a gun, he'll have a knife". Granted, but society has to weigh each situation individually. Does the knife serve humanity as a tool enough to offset the danger? Perhaps. Perhaps not. How about guns? Maybe, maybe not.
At some point, don't we get to question the validity of the tenets of our forefathers? I mean, it wasn't that long ago that Ronald Reagan was telling us how smooth his brand of smokes were. It wasn't that long ago that buying black people was an ok thing to do.
Just because it was a good idea 200+ years ago doesn't necessarily make it an idea that ages well.
Is there no room for critical re-examination of these cornerstones to see if we, as a people, have evolved past them? I have a hard time believing the founding fathers thought they would be interpreted so literally hundreds of years later.
Also, I am not the AC upthread. You sound like someone who is very dyed in the wool in your position and I want to understand.
and Big Wheels. My youth in a very short sentence.
Had both eyes done at once (Lasik) and mine were bad but with minor astigmatism. I thik they were like 20/200+ each before.
After a VERY simple procedure (apart from the razor cutting a flap in your cornea), the recovery process was about 2 days long and now, after 1 year, I have absolutely no ill effects (apart from temp night halos for a bit but they went away after about 6 months).
Vision now 20/20 left eye, 20/15 right eye.
with a simple ascii response of a web page to my simple http style request.
Wow, no I don't remember that, Your Geek-Fu is strong.
Nope, I mean exactly what I wrote. It's funny how I started to get modded to Offtopic by those less geeky than me.
Did you hear something?...
"It's a fair cop" is quite common British slang for getting busted by the cops. I have read in numerous places as well as a published script for the movie and the line is indeed "It's a fair cop".
I for one welcome blah blah blah.
Wow, if I had mod points, I would lash one to you right now for reminding me of this item. I checked the page and lo and behold, my name was just dragged through the interplanetary mud, so to speak.
...hence the use of "365.242199days/year" as opposed to 365.
whoops... messy...
Would you mind detailing exactly which of these he had authorization to do?
1. Use gate program to create an opening in the corporate firewall against (twice expressed) wishes of employer.
2. Download the password file from a department he was no longer working in (or authorized to be working in) and run a password cracking program on it.
3. Extract and store, offsite, over 35 compromised passwords from same file.
So, since these seem to be the basic facts of the story, as I read it, perhaps shedding some light on which of these he had permission to do would help your story. In fact, the information I read shows exactly the opposite of what you are saying.
I have not seen the details of the jump but he will likely be using a drogue chute as did Joe Kittinger in the 50's.
A drogue chute is a small parachute that is deployed to slow the terminal velocity of a skydiver to a manageable level. If you have ever watched a tandem jump (skydiving instructor attached directly to the student at the shoulders and hips from the rear) you have seen a drogue chute. They are used because tandems present equal surface area but roughy double the mass (sometimes more) of a normail, sungle skydiver and tend to accelerate to un-manageable speeds. (The faster you travel, the more violent and "touchy" the body movements become having greater and greater effect on relative position in the air.)
In the case of Kittinger's space jump, his drogue was substantially larger than the main parachutes we use today but the density of the air is so thin that it needs to be very large to have any effect.
Actually, I believe the character is modelled after the 80's New Wave band of the same name.
That redhead was wicked hot.
I think the direct cause of the loss of the technology (as well as the time spent in luddite-ville) would have a definite effect on the speed and method of re-development.
If it was a "instant" catastrophe that caused the loss, I would like to think that the people in the world best suited to redesign and rebuild the technlogy base would commit themselves to the critical systems first. Health care, transport, communications, certain infrastructure.
The big problem I see is with the vast majority of the population ignorant of anything beyond how to shut down before turning off their machine. After critical systems have been restored, the work on revenue generating tech can begin. I have a hard time believeing that the industry giants will tolerate anything but the minimum amount of time required to become re-operational (This will be further exascerbated by the now-evident feeling of "being the first x-business back in operation".)
In short, if that is possible, I feel our rush to re-tech the world will overshadow our desire to redesign it past our old limitations. Certainly some innovations will become evident but they will primarily focus on tech that is purpose built to quickly re-equip (tech wise) the world.
An interesting thought. Would Microsoft be able to re-establish their dominance? I have often thought that their market share is due to an exisiting install base.
I'd recognize a dolphin troll anywhere. Sadly for you, net-mush, I know the truth.
That reminds me of this.
Battlestar Galactica was an ok show but the only thing that held any interest for me as a child was the Vipers. Those were the coolset space fighters around. I used to draw them all the time in school...
But..., that piece of crap pales in comparison to the majesty that was Space 1999. I wish they would remake THAT show. I had nightmares for months about the episode where they came across a spaceship graveyard which had a tentacle monster that would pull you undernetath itself and then slide out a smoking, charred corpse. By your command indeed.
I know it's off topic. Mod me down, I don't care but someone please remake Space 1999!
I feel I am in a position to pretend my opinion on this matter is important and espouse it thus:
I worked with co-op students from, primarily, the high school level. One noticeable way to classify them:
Student 1> "I was watching that guy over there and it looks like he is working on something I would be interested in. I was hoping it would be ok to look over his shoulder and maybe ask a question or two."
Student2 (to his/her friends after work)> " I went to my job co-op today and had to stand around until someone gave me a bunch of boxes to stuff. That place sucks."
You can guess which one is more memorable when it comes time to hiring later in life.
The test I use is the removal test. Who would be most hurt if the co-op program was removed. Industry would survive without the cheap labor as it must. Education would also survive but I can't help but think that it would be less an experience without the opportunity to spend time in the real element. The loss to education is greater than that to industry. Although you feel that it is industry that is somehow benefitting from this exploitation of cheap labor, please remember where you are standing in the first place. Those who take hold and squeeze will get the most from the experience. Those who expect a scripted, curricular experience are missing the boat and will, ultimately, feel the way you do.
Look at Slashdot, anyone who is a regular reader here is aware of the amazing amount of divergent opinions present on any number of topics by our community.
How many times have you been in, or overheard, a conversation with contemporaries and heard things like "That guy didn't know what the hell he was doing..." or "I guess that is how Company XYZ does it but we do it right etc...". I am sure I will be taken to task for the generalization but we are a very cannabalistic bunch and we all have a very distinct idea of what is good Kung-Fu and what is paper MCSE stuff. We also don't mind sharing our opinions. This story is a good example. I don't know the details of the situation but who am I to judge that the submitter isn't the real idiot who wouldn't know a good plan if it bit him. No offense, I am sure that isn't the case but I am sure not going to take him at face value. People who don't know jack about computers (read most of the population) will certainly listen to him though, right or wrong.
Anyone who has been in a computer store and listened to a salesman talk about another computer store's products or staff knows exactly what I mean. It's no wonder people don't trust us. We all tell them not to trust the next guy. Unfortunately, he is sayng the same thing and he sounds just as smart and knowledable as you.